Tableside Manners

Drunk: Tableside Manners

Drunk's fourth full-length demonstrates first and foremost that Drunk is a band hellbent on not making the same record twice. Call it chronic reinvention syndrome. While it has been fairly easy to gauge how Drunk have changed sonically over the years, it has been much trickier to track the band's musical development -- or, more specifically, the evolution of Rick Alverson's songwriting. For instance, the band's third record, RAISED TOWARD, features songs from Alverson's warchest that were written way before Drunk was even conceptualized. Which makes TABLESIDE MANNERS different -- it is thoroughly a collection of Alverson's newest songs, all of which make a very strong case for Alverson's recent emergence as an important, truly distinctive American songwriter.